I was waiting for my doctor at the hospital, visibly bored and a little irritated due to the delay in my appointment. The hospital happened to be near the road, busy with traffic adding to my agony. Reading was not an option thanks to the very high decibel level and all I could do was to look outside window and watch the traffic whirling dervish with energy.
The throbbing, pulsating traffic at the road below, reflected frenzied pace of the city. My attention was grabbed by an old couple's struggle to cross the road which seemed like Herculean task! The couple kept trying several times but in vain! It must have been a few minutes and I heard a loud thud. A bus trying to overtake a car, misjudged the vehicle near it and collided with a handcart, loaded with vegetables. The handcart puller, hurled into air and tumbled on the road, his goods lay strewn all around. The traffic came to stand still, causing deafening turmoil.
People started getting restless, thinking about the delay and started shouting at the cart puller to clear the road that he was blocking. Nobody ventured out of their vehicles to rescue the cart puller from his incredibly skewed predicament! The poor man, terrified with sheer helplessness, stared at his damaged cart and started getting nervous and scared with each abuse hurled at him. After a while, a group of eunuchs, who ask for alms at the traffic signal, rushed to the site and helped the bleeding cart puller, gather his normal self. Soon, a traffic police arrived. After exchanging some harsh words with the bus driver and the cart puller, he managed to clear the chaos and in few minutes, normalcy ensued on the road.
Something within me snapped after watching this painful episode. I have experienced many situations where people have shown extraordinary behaviour and gone out of their way to help in exigencies like this! But witnessing this accident posed some uncomfortable questions in my mind. I am yet to understand why couldn't anyone show some decency and help the old couple cross the road or the cartpuller get over his shock ? Why nobody spared a few moments to reach out to these people? Why are we so devoid of basic human ingredient called compassion, sometimes? How would people at the accident site behave if they were mauled in a situation like this, instead of that cartpuller? What makes us so insensitive that we become completely detached to suffering of others?
Human behaviour always fascinates me but witnessing this accident was very traumatic.My grandmother's words were ringing in my head while I returned home. She always used to say that we start dying when we stop feeling pain of people around us!
